Not that he neglected the traditional elements of the crime novel in these books. The setting – a modern urban landscape where it seems to rain constantly, with a harsh underbelly of seedy bars and gambling clubs populated by drug addicts and prostitutes – was a world away from the traditional country house murder mystery, but Higgins still played by the rules of the game, and in both The Graveyard Shift and Hell is Always Today there are fairly laid clues early on as to the identity of the main villain. (And it should be noted that Hell is Always Today features a serial killer who predates both the real Yorkshire Ripper and the fictional Hannibal Lecter.)

By contrast, Brought in Dead, the second book in the trilogy, is more of an all-action revenge thriller in which the identity of the villain is never really in doubt. The suspense Higgins generates comes from whether Miller can – or should – prevent a private, very personal, vendetta in a gripping shoot-out in the countryside.

Nick Miller may not be a typical British policeman, but he was certainly a typical Jack Higgins hero. At the age of 26 and with a law degree, he is young for a Detective Sergeant, having been, as we would say today, ‘fast-tracked’ through the recruitment process, and has already collected six official commendations. This naturally causes resentment among his fellow officers who have ‘come up through the ranks’ and possibly explains why Miller draws so many night (‘graveyard’) shifts.

Not that this seems to worry Nick Miller unduly, as he is certainly not a man to skulk in the shadows. He drives the latest souped-up Mini-Cooper and, thanks to a family business, not only has financial security but also access to an E-type Jaguar. He has his own fashion sense, favouring Chelsea boots, a hand-stitched dark blue Swedish trenchcoat and a German army style ‘rain cap’ (well, it was the Sixties); and as an accomplished pianist, he is not afraid to duet with the resident jazz pianist in one of the many nightclubs he has to visit.

Naturally, when it comes to the rough stuff Miller can take care of himself: he has a brown belt in judo and is something of a dab-hand at karate, an almost compulsory skill for the heroes of thriller fiction at the time, notable examples being Adam Hall’s Quiller, James Munro’s John Craig and Andrew York’s ‘Eliminator’ Jonas Wilde, not forgetting Cathy Gale and Emma Peel from The Avengers.

The Nick Miller trilogy is, of course, of its time, but no less interesting for that, depicting a gritty world of dank canals, coal fires, gas lamps, Bobbies on the beat, telephone boxes, Sunday sports papers and stocking-tops. It was a world where the ‘officer class’ could, and sometimes did, get away with murder and where, lower down the social scale, simply seeking to change a £10 note was regarded as highly suspicious and probably an arrestable offence.